


Fill Your Mountains

by IvyOnTheHolodeck



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Angst, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 00:07:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7383043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IvyOnTheHolodeck/pseuds/IvyOnTheHolodeck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elim Garak is redefining what it means to have a bad day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fill Your Mountains

There really ought to be a limit to the number of losses a man can sustain in a single day.

His planet is ravaged, his people slaughtered, the best hope for his government's recovery dead on the floor. Someone has mentioned a funeral, but how can they grieve for one man when there are two hundred million others gone, lost to the wreckage and the dust?

And if they may not mourn their glorious leader, how can he mourn his nurse, his sweet old nurse, the woman who'd made his meals and kept his secrets for years, murdered and tossed down the stairs like so much trash?

And when faced with the Dominion’s travesties, his beloved Cardassia in shambles, how dare he even think to regret that Julian Bashir has found a girlfriend?

Garak has somehow acquired a control room and a few idiots to staff it. They're calling in orders across the planet, reinstating old powers for the interim - people who know how to rule, if not how to rule well. Garak will figure out who should actually be in charge later. At some point, after endless hours of phone calls and casualty reports and cowards - _cowards! afraid to do their duty, to serve their planet, their home_ \- some messenger taps Garak on the shoulder and tells him Bashir wants to speak to him.

A few days ago, Garak might have opened up. Under the pressure and anxiety and the grief, he might have finally admitted what he's been trying to hide for the past seven years. Now, though, Julian Bashir has a girlfriend, a pretty, clever counselor to converse with over lunch, and Garak is silent.

Their parting is short and painful. How much can you say when you can't say anything? Garak doesn't even admit that he has assumed control of the government. _Oh, by the way, my dear doctor, I happen to now be the single most powerful individual on this planet. Yes, it is quite the lark, given my people washed their hands with me when they still could. Oh no, it appears my little "problem" has been temporarily forgotten._ The door has slid shut behind the retreating doctor, so the sole leader of Cardassia allows himself a moment to brace himself against his new desk and sneer.

If only Julian Bashir knew Garak had been expelled from the Obsidian Order for being attracted to the wrong gender.


End file.
